TED Talks

I am embarrassed to admit that I discovered TED Talks relatively late in my career. Of the many I have listened to, the ones below resonated with me the most. I hope that you find them as inspirational as I have.

*NOTE: The first three TED Talks below were given by Sir Ken Robinson, A New York Times bestselling author who led national and international projects on creative and cultural education across the world, unlocking and igniting the creative energy of people and organizations. Sir Ken was the most-watched speaker in TED’s history, with his 2006 talk ‘Do Schools Kill Creativity?’ being viewed online over 60 million times and seen by an estimated 380 million people in 160 countries (as of 8/21/20). You can read more about this champion of education here.

Do schools kill creativity?Sir Ken Robinson makes an entertaining and profoundly moving case for creating an education system that nurtures (rather than undermines) creativity.

How to escape education's death valleySir Ken Robinson outlines 3 principles crucial for the human mind to flourish -- and how current education culture works against them. In a funny, stirring talk he tells us how to get out of the educational "death valley" we now face, and how to nurture our youngest generations with a climate of possibility.

Bring on the learning revolution!In this poignant, funny follow-up to his fabled 2006 talk, Sir Ken Robinson makes the case for a radical shift from standardized schools to personalized learning -- creating conditions where kids' natural talents can flourish.

Grit: The power of passion and perseveranceLeaving a high-flying job in consulting, Angela Lee Duckworth took a job teaching math to seventh graders in a New York public school. She quickly realized that IQ wasn't the only thing separating the successful students from those who struggled. Here, she explains her theory of "grit" as a predictor of success.

This is what it's like to go undercover in North KoreaFor six months, Suki Kim worked as an English teacher at an elite school for North Korea's future leaders -- while writing a book on one of the world's most repressive regimes. As she helped her students grapple with concepts like "truth" and "critical thinking," she came to wonder: Was teaching these students to seek the truth putting them in peril? (This talk was part of a session at TED2015 guest-curated by Pop-Up Magazine: popupmagazine.com or @popupmag on Twitter.)

Clint Smith - The Danger of Silence (Transcript)

LESSON - The Danger of Silence by Clint Smith

Every kid needs a championRita Pierson, a teacher for 40 years, once heard a colleague say, "They don't pay me to like the kids." Her response: "Kids don't learn from people they don't like.'" A rousing call to educators to believe in their students and actually connect with them on a real, human, personal level.

The danger of a single storyOur lives, our cultures, are composed of many overlapping stories. Novelist Chimamanda Adichie tells the story of how she found her authentic cultural voice -- and warns that if we hear only a single story about another person or country, we risk a critical misunderstanding.

Inside the mind of a master procrastinatorTim Urban knows that procrastination doesn't make sense, but he's never been able to shake his habit of waiting until the last minute to get things done. In this hilarious and insightful talk, Urban takes us on a journey through YouTube binges, Wikipedia rabbit holes and bouts of staring out the window -- and encourages us to think harder about what we're really procrastinating on, before we run out of time.

How to raise successful kids -- without over-parentingBy loading kids with high expectations and micromanaging their lives at every turn, parents aren't actually helping. At least, that's how Julie Lythcott-Haims sees it. With passion and wry humor, the former Dean of Freshmen at Stanford makes the case for parents to stop defining their children's success via grades and test scores. Instead, she says, they should focus on providing the oldest idea of all: unconditional love.

How data from a crisis text line is saving livesWhen a young woman texted DoSomething.org with a heartbreaking cry for help, the organization responded by opening a nationwide Crisis Text Line for people in pain. Nearly 10 million text messages later, the organization is using the privacy and power of text messaging to help people handle addiction, suicidal thoughts, eating disorders, sexual abuse and more. But there's an even bigger win: The anonymous data collected by text is teaching us when crises are most likely to happen -- and helping schools and law enforcement to prepare for them.

Let's teach for mastery -- not test scoresWould you choose to build a house on top of an unfinished foundation? Of course not. Why, then, do we rush students through education when they haven't always grasped the basics? Yes, it's complicated, but educator Sal Khan shares his plan to turn struggling students into scholars by helping them master concepts at their own pace.

This is not a TED Talk.

But if you know anything about the Holocaust or Auschwitz or Elie Wiesel, then you know how powerful this interview is.

Winfrey & Wiesel - Auschwitz (Part 1)

Below is an activity sheet you can use with students to help them become better listeners.

TED Talk worksheet.pdf

To snag this gem of a resource, visit Laura Randazzo's "Teachers Pay Teachers" site here!

For argument's sakeWhy do we argue? To out-reason our opponents, prove them wrong, and, most of all, to win! Right? Philosopher Daniel H. Cohen shows how our most common form of argument -- a war in which one person must win and the other must lose -- misses out on the real benefits of engaging in active disagreement.

Argumentative vs. Persuasive Writing Lesson - TED Talk Pairing

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